October 23 - Sunday - a day of rest

We all had a bit of a lie in today and after breakfast Shelley suggested we go to the malecon (boardwalk) in Chapala for the afternoon, so we headed out around 1:30pm - it's only a five minute drive and it took a while to find a parking spot as everyone and their brother was down there - Sunday is family day in Mexico, but we found a spot up by the Notario's office which is just across the street.

We headed straight for a restaurant which was down by the water and had an amazing lunch - Shelley had cheese stuffed shrimp wrapped in bacon, Trevor had beef brochettes, Colin had a seafood mix and I had scallops. The margueritas were free! After lunch and a number of refreshing beverages the kids set out to walk the malecon, Colin headed for the market (which runs parallel to the malecon) and I headed to a bench to people-watch and take photos.

The sun was hot and sparkling on the water and there were tons of boats out giving people rides back and forth along the lake. There were a lot of people in the water swimming and playing, and on the beach and tons of families just wandering around or sitting like me, people-watching - there were people selling balloons and kids toys, ice cream sellers, musicians everywhere, mariachi and dancers. It was awesome. I took a ton of photos and then bought an ice cream from one of the vendors. It comes in metal cylinders stored in a tub of ice and when you buy one, he takes it out of the container and wraps a piece of firm paper around the base to hold it by - the ice cream is very firm and gorgeous. I got vanilla but it had a huge chunk of raspberry right down one side. I sat in the hot sun and ate my ice cream and then a bunch of people showed up with costumes and music equipment and set up right by the fountain in front of me. They got changed and were just getting ready to start dancing when Shelley, Trevor and Colin showed up so we sat and watched. It was a lot of fun and they did a number of different dances and their costumes were very traditional, huge full skirts edged with colourful edging which they swirled round and round.

We got home around 6pm very tired considering we hadn't done anything but eat and drink - I guess the sun wears you out. But what a great way to spend the day!